Mark Abernethy - Golden Serpent

The warehouse covered half a block. Perched on a corner hidden from the warehouse’s view, they could see across the road that the Arrow freight depot and warehouse had two entrances: one from the cross street and the other from the main street. A three-level administration block fronted the building, set back from a forty-metre apron. To the right of the offi ce section was a large dark-red roller door. Closed. A pedestrian door was set in the main door. Also closed. Behind the door, the warehouse roof stretched one hundred and twenty metres.

Down the cross street side of the structure, there was another large roller door and an open parking lot.

Sawtell double-checked the location. Wouldn’t pay to be stealthing around the wrong building.

Sawtell turned to Paul. ‘Looks to me like two sections to this; that offi ce section and the warehouse section. We’ll take the offi ce. You two take the warehouse. Copy?’

Paul nodded.

‘Right, ladies. Check radios,’ said Sawtell.

Hands went up to earpieces while Sawtell rattled off the alphabet in Alpha Bravo Charlies. Got six thumbs-up.

‘Check clocks: on my marks…’

Everyone started their mission clocks.

‘Check weapons.’

Slides slid, mags dropped out and eyes looked down spouts. One of the Green Berets pulled the zip on his ovies down and checked the smoke grenades on his webbing.

Sawtell checked his own Beretta, took a breath, said, ‘Ladies, you never get a second chance to make a fi rst impression.’

‘Fucking eh,’ came an American voice in reply.

Mac checked for cameras, saw a dome protruding from the wall above the side entrance. Looked to the main entrance. Saw a dome there too.

He pointed them out to Paul.

‘If we go through the offi cial entries someone’s going to know about it,’ said Mac.

‘Ideas?’

‘Just the oldest one in the book.’

‘Rough but effective,’ said Paul, keying the mic and asking Sawtell if their fi rst stop might be downstairs in the fuse box room.

‘Found cameras?’ said Sawtell.

‘One over each entrance.’

‘How long you need?’

Paul looked at Mac, who said, ‘Twenty seconds.’

‘Stand-by,’ said Sawtell.

Mac and Paul started down the cross street, hands in pockets, eyeing the warehouse door from across the road as they walked. In his pocket Mac felt the two thin wire jiggers from Spikey’s bag of tricks.

They crossed the road, catching glimpses of the warehouse door through mid-sized trees. The pedestrian entrance was locked with a standard Lockwood device and if it was the type Mac had trained on, he’d only need ten seconds. If he sweated, slipped and screwed it up, he’d need the twenty. Twenty seconds was an optimum time to pull the power down in Jakkers. It was long enough that when you started it up again the bad guys might assume it was the unreliable power supply on the blink.

Sawtell sit-repped: Spikey had walked straight in the front entrance, and dipped down to the basement.

Mac and Paul veered left and walked towards the side entry door fi fty metres away, their eyes locked on the fl uoro lights under the awning over the side entrance. Their breathing was ragged now, their hands sweaty in the afternoon humidity. It had to be thirty-fi ve degrees. They closed on the door, waiting for the power to be killed.

The lights went down and Mac and Paul ran the last fi ve strides to the door, Mac dragging out the jiggers. First one in, holding the barrel where you want it. His fi ngers slid on the wire. He jigged the second piece of wire over the top of the fi rst, twisted and pushed upward from the front to the back of the lock. The second part of the mechanism turned and Paul’s pressure on the door made it click inwards.

Paul held his SIG in his right hand, pushed through with his left.

Mac followed. The fl uoros fl ashed on again. Paul shut the door gently as Mac moved into the interior.

The lights in the warehouse were fl ickering back to life too.

They swept with their guns. It looked like they had the place to themselves. There was a large empty indoor space in front of them, obviously where traffi c passed through. To the right were lanes of stacked containers.

Suddenly they heard voices and slid to the right four paces, crouching behind red containers stacked two-up.

Indonesian voices echoed around the warehouse, coming closer.

Paul stuck his head around, pulled back. ‘They’re just checking the place with a fl ashlight. What the fuck you need a fl ashlight for when the lights have gone back on?’

Paul looked again. ‘Okay, so now they’re looking at the ceiling.

And wouldn’t you know it – lights!’

Paul turned and looked down the narrow alleyway where the containers didn’t quite touch the steel side of the warehouse. It ran to the end of the building. ‘Better recce, eh mate?’

Mac nodded. If there was an offi ce or a van at the other end of the structure, they’d better fi nd it. The girls and the woman were not going to come to them.

They jogged fast, jumping old brooms, Coke cans, dead spiders and porn mags: the detritus of warehouse life. At the end of the container row, Mac poked his head round the corner. There was another roller door entrance at this end of the building. Blood pumped in Mac’s ears, his kevlar vest swimming on a layer of sweat.

There was an offi ce perched up on a mezzanine at the far corner, set up so it could look down on the warehouse. There was also a ramp leading down to a sub-level.

Paul gestured. He’d go into the sub-level. Mac should check the other side of this level and the raised offi ce.

Mac made across the rear roller door area, veering left in an arc to avoid the static camera over the inside of the door area. Heading for the raised offi ce he looked down the corridors between the container stacks. His stance was perfect but there was no one to aim at. There seemed to be tons of freight in the joint, but no work being done.

The stairs to the offi ce were single helix. He stopped for two seconds, caught his breath. Paul crackled on the receiver. ‘Okay, Mac?’

‘Right as rain.’

He took it easy up the stairwell. It was open so he could see straight to the top. It also left him exposed should anyone walk into the warehouse.

The door to the offi ce had a glass panel in it. Mac peeked through: couldn’t see anyone. Pushed through the door. Walked across the fl oor area to what looked like a storage area.

A bang.

Mac froze. Lifted the Heckler.

More bangs, different tones. A gunfi ght. Mac ran down the stairs, trying to get his breath, not panic. It took an effort to run towards a gunfi ght rather than away from it.

The gunshots were coming from the other end, up in the offi ce area. Sawtell’s boys getting stuck in. Mac sprinted down the central corridor of the containers, an area large enough to get two trucks past at once.

Then the noises started coming from below him, the concrete almost shaking with the blasts. There were shouts, adrenaline-soaked male voices, crazed with anger or fear. Hard to tell.

Radio crackled. Paul, panting, ‘Mac. Get here now!’

Mac doubled back at a sprint, fl ying right into the curved downward ramp to the sub-level, face to face with Peter Garrison, fi fty metres away at the bottom of the ramp. They stared at each other, mouths open, panting, confused. Garrison raised his M4 with both hands. Mac was about to squeeze off when his leg gave out from under him. He spilled forward, lost his sights. His groin made a tearing sensation, his inside left knee hit concrete. Garrison fi red over the top of him, chipping concrete all the way up the ramp.

He hadn’t shouldered the M4 properly and it recoiled upwards and away to the right.